Today the writing question happens to be naming the thing I am most proud.

As a mother, I would immediately shout out, “my kids!” Giving birth to them, sharing their lives with them, seeing their accomplishments through the years—yes, hands down I would not have to think much harder or longer than my three.

And what makes me most proud as Megan, the individual?

I’m still thinking about that one. I wish it could be something like taking in a homeless family, running off to volunteer in Guatemala, saving up my dimes and dollars for a child to receive medical care in a developing country.

I do love the notion I had, though, of going off to Ireland and the tiny island off its west coast with no one planning it but me, and relying on no one but me (as well as the host of the yoga studio who was expecting me!) Friends still like to remind me of the confidence it took to go it alone as I did, although I think of it only as a very strong desire after my Dad died and I so needed reflection.

I also think of the walk across the graduation stage, my kids in the audience and yellow sash draped over me, signifying graduate honors as another moment of genuine pride.

And there is one more.

Telling my personal story in front of an audience of executives and community leaders –all contributors of the United Way– who wanted to know how I won the money prize. Every year the local career center chooses their “Woman of Promise” for writing an essay on how they got through a major life transition.

I wrote an essay as a newly divorced mom and student at the center, sharing how I pulled myself through the inevitable changes after my 17 year marriage ended.

A re-do of the same old, tired, crumbly mindsets that offer little more than to keep us in the same holding pattern of living, day after day, year after year.

And how might this be done?

Meditation.

Incorporating more pleasure in our everyday.

Movement.

Gratitude.

Tapping into an aware breath.

First thing in the morning we can create the most optimal, energizing, extraordinary start to a new day. It can help us form new pathways in our brains. And to start this re-do? It can be as simple as acknowledging the breath at the nostrils.

And how does something as simple as this awareness create such subtle yet profound changes in the way we move through our day?

It is because the breaths’ free and open movement in the body adds to or subtracts from the healthy functioning of our nervous system, and oh, how much that system can juice us up with vitality, or deflate us entirely.

This optimal and simple plan is a practice. A practice, a structure, a container for sculpting a new life.

It is a plan that can help the anxious, the frazzled, the exhausted, the lonely, the doubtful, for taking the steps towards a life with purpose. A life well lived.

I have an assignment—- to write my thoughts on what is it about our world that makes me angry. This question comes from Scott Dinsmore’s “Live Your Legend” 7 day blog writing challenge, and this is the first task. I had a moment where I felt that I wouldn’t tackle this one, or that [...]

Why did I not write for months and months…. I’m wondering that still. I think I just chose to close up the pipeline to hearing my inspiration. For some reason I felt not so confident with my direction, with my work, with where I needed to be. With all the fogginess I couldn’t make out [...]

How is it that we so easily forget our own internal ability for simply being—–happy? Now that science is becoming more curious about spirituality, we ‘re beginning to see how the human mind is the driver. Just because we’ve been conditioned to behave a certain way by our culture, we’ve developed the very addictive habit [...]

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Gabby Bernstein is a fellow adventurer on the spiritual quest, and she has some wonderful ways of strengthening a meditation practice and making it more front and center in our lives with these mantras: “I am calm now” Repeat to yourself as a walking meditation or just as a mantra while sitting. “Peace is within [...]

Last post I closed with “more to come” about my listener, Mike, who was at my presentation some weeks ago on how we can de-stress… Mike, (whose name I changed and if you recognize yourself here, “Mike,” I hope you won’t be offended that I’m sharing this right now) came up to me after I [...]

I spoke recently to a group about the very relevant topic of how to de-stress both IN the workplace and in life. They sat around the conference table looking in various stages of interest as I mentioned that we are in a time of the “ordinary awakening,” as I first heard it from the modern [...]

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